Page 88 of One to Watch

NickiG: NOT SOON ENOUGH

Enna-Jay: Has anything like this ever happened before?? That was … awful

KeyboardCat: I mean, there’s never been a plus-size person on this show before, so no, not really.

Enna-Jay: Can Bea just leave? SHOULD she?

KeyboardCat: No!! She still has good guys left!!

Beth.Malone: That’s a hot take, Cat

KeyboardCat: I believe!! #TeamAsher

Beth.Malone:

Colin7784: jeez, you guys have been right this whole time

Beth.Malone: Yes definitely. About what?

Colin7784: men are trash

@AndersMMQB You all gave me shit when I said they shouldn’t put a fat woman on Main Squeeze, but look what happened!

@AndersMMQB This isn’t the UN, dummies. It’s reality TV. If you put a fat cow on there, people are going to call her one. It’s not Jefferson’s fault for speaking the truth. It’s Bea’s fault for expecting anything different.

In the hour after Jefferson’s outburst and Bea’s dramatic exit, her greatest source of comfort was the lock on her bedroom door. The door itself was heavy and wood, stained dark and engraved with intricate latticework. The key was old-fashioned, thick and brass, and the lock emitted a satisfying click when Bea shut out the entire mess of her life.

Bea paced the floor beside the little settee where, just the night before, Luc had held her and assured her she was beautiful. What an idiot she’d been to believe he was telling the truth.

What did she know about these men, really? Luc was a player, Wyatt was lovely but a bit of a mystery, Sam was an exuberant kid, and Asher … Asher. Maybe he was just fooling himself. Maybe she was too.

It was after midnight now—their flight back to America departed in seven hours.

“I should pack,” Bea said to no one in particular. But she didn’t. She sat on her bed, still in her gown, her face in her hands. One breath in, another out. All those weeks of holding the men at bay, trying not to form attachments—as much as that hurt, it was better than this. She should have listened to Lauren.

She tried to convince herself that this was no big deal—after all, what was she really losing? They were just hopes. They’d been intense, maybe, but she could live without them. Put off her chances at happiness for another few weeks until all this was over, just as she’d done so many times before. Waiting to schedule dates until after she got home from this next trip, after she finished up this project, after she lost a little weight. After, always after, until her romantic life became a kind of stasis, cryogenically suspended in a perpetual state of anticipation.

After this show is over, my life will change. I’ll meet so many new people. Maybe I’ll find someone then.

And then, a knock on her door.

Go away.

Another knock.

“Bea, are you in there?”

Was that Sam?

“Of course she’s there. The producers said as much.”

And Asher.

“Dude, I know she’s in there, but it’s after midnight, I’m trying to be polite.”

“Maybe she’s sleeping?”

There was Wyatt.